Natural Born Killers

Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers

What a world we live in today.  The hours I have spent analyzing why we have so much more crime and crazy people on this planet have brought me no answers.  This is why I don't like puzzles.  Putting all the pieces together so painstakingly, then getting to the end and there's one piece missing.  Just one.  But it's that one you need to complete the picture. 

And suddenly, it was all a big, stinking waste of time.

Guns are more accessible today - true.  Violence is much more graphically portrayed in games, movies, television, music - true.  I can't even flip the pages of my TV Guide anymore without some disgusting zombie staring back at me in all their ghoulish glory.  More and more people are being born from drugged up mothers - true.  Results?  More brain damage.  And the population boom increases the odds that much more.  Remember when getting knocked up was a sin, and not a guaranteed check from the government?

Honestly, I don't know if the desensitization to violence is the issue or not.  I'd vehemently argued for this past decade or more that it's parents to blame, who don't talk to their children.  Who don't explain what it means to take the life of another person.  Who don't hold their children responsible for bullying others, or that there are consequences to any of their actions, good or bad. 

Entitlement has become an epidemic in our country.  Natural born killers, homegrown in good old America.  Cult leaders no longer need to work so hard to find followers, it simply takes a few clicks of the mouse and the Kool-Aid drinking begins.  Our children are growing up to see 'stars' such as the Columbine shooters, or Seung-Hui Cho, who tore up Virginia Tech in the name of love.  How about the fame that surrounded John Hinckley, Jr., who attempted an assasination of then-President Reagen to catch the attention of actress Jodie Foster? 

I don't know about you, but I can honestly say that this face sends chills rumbling through my bones.  It is a face of evil, and the face of the up and coming generation of 20somethings invading our society.  Jared Lee Loughner ruthlessly shot at Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, killed half a dozen others, including 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Green, and injured more than a dozen other people. 

But to someone out there, he's a hero. 

These are the pied pipers leading the nation. 

Now it is Rodrick Shonte Dantzler's turn in the spotlight.  A shooting spree that took the lives of seven people, and then his own. 

If killings have to happen, the truth is I wish the killer would more often take themselves out.  Save the taxpayers the cost of the trial, and the money to support their life behind bars.  Let them judge themselves, and commence their own executions.  Then we, as a public, don't have to fear that technicalities will place them back on the streets to roam amongst us, to strike again. 

Maybe right now you're thinking how desensitized I am to the value of a human life.  I'll tell you this:  I value my own, and the lives of the innocent, more than I ever will of someone who took the life of another for their own gratification.  I will hero-worship a vigilante any day over the likes of a wannabe star with intent to kill. 

Funny thing is, a vigilante will put more effort into being certain their street justice is validated than most attorneys do in a courtroom. 

Now I wonder who's really to blame?  Society, as a whole?  The makers of video games that exploit the great joy of killing prostitutes while on a crime spree?  Maybe it's even me, with my support of the death penalty, my consumption of television shows that showcase a murder a week.  Maybe.  But I know my rights from my wrongs, even when I'm committing wrong-doings.

The difference is, I'm not out there pulling a trigger.

Adam Lambert - Mad World